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By Michelle
Ma,
Gabrielle Coppola and Ben
Elgin
Tesla co-founder JB
Straubel’s battery recycling firm Redwood
Materials cut
dozens of jobs as the startup scales back
some of its ambitious projects to refocus on
tapping into demand for grid-scale batteries.
The staffing
reductions occurred this month and were spread
across the company, according to people familiar
with the matter who asked not to be named
because the information is private.
The cuts were equal
to about 5% to 6% of
the company’s workforce, and included employees
in cathode material engineering. The job
reductions reflected a shift of resources to
critical minerals and energy storage, according
to one of the people.
Redwood declined to
comment.
Batteries
from consumer electronics at a Redwood
Materials recycling facility Photographer:
Emily Najera/Bloomberg
The closely held
company led by Straubel was founded in 2017 to
create what he called a “closed-loop” supply
chain for the products in the US. The business
model has included collecting end-of-life cells
for reuse and repurposing them to make battery
materials.
But with EV sales
failing to meet expectations, there’s been a
shakeout among US battery recycling companies
that’s increased competition for limited battery
feedstock. China’s grip on the supply chain has
also lowered commodity prices and eroded profit
margins. The industry is facing additional
challenges from the Trump administration, which
has canceled hundreds of millions of dollars in
grants to other battery recyclers and eliminated
incentives for EVs.
Read the full
story, including how Redwood is
adjusting to the Trump era.
Over the last two
weeks, tens of thousands of people took to the
city of Belem, at the mouth of the Amazon River,
for the annual United Nations climate summit:
COP30. Alongside tense negotiations, there were
indigenous protests, daily rainstorms and even a
fire at the COP venue. But at the end of it all,
what did COP30 achieve? Bloomberg Green’s
Jennifer Dlouhy joins Akshat Rathi on Zero, to
share her takeaways.
Listen
now, and subscribe on Apple, Spotify or YouTube to
get new episodes of Zero every Thursday.
In New York and
looking for something to do over Thanksgiving
weekend besides Black Friday shopping? Film
Forum will be screening Teenage
Wasteland, a documentary about a
high school A/V assignment that becomes a
shocking investigation into political corruption
and environmental degradation in an upstate New
York town. The film, formerly dubbed Middletown and
screened at this year’s Bloomberg
Green Doc’s competition, is a gripping mix
of archival footage and present-day interviews
with the students who uncovered the wrongdoing
and the teacher who inspired them.
Screenings start
this Wednesday and Friday and Saturday evening
showing include a Q&A with the filmmakers.
Vine
harvest in France Photographer: Balint
Porneczi/Bloomberg
France, one of the
world’s top winemakers, will disburse €130
million ($150 million) to help farmers uproot
more vines in a sector hit hard by climate
change, weak global demand and trade wars.
The government is
allocating the funds to finance a new permanent
vine removal plan, Agriculture Minister Annie
Genevard said in a statement. Other measures
include the extension of structural loans to the
end of 2026 and the reduction of some social
charges.
Global wine
consumption is dwindling as changing drinking
patterns, lackluster economic conditions and
tariffs wars hurt producers around the world.
France cut its
estimate for this year’s wine output to
below 2024’s historically low level, after heat
waves and wildfires hit vineyards.
Read the full
story on Bloomberg.com
A $150 million
facility backed by the
UK government’s development-finance arm and
South Africa’s FirstRand will offer loans
to fund the green transition of companies
in carbon-intensive industries in Africa.
Japan is in talks
with South Africa over potentially
helping the country finance
the reorganization of its energy sector.
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